Apparatus for printing on glass and the like



Jan. 26, 1937. c. e. ANDERSON APfARATUS FOR PRINTING ON GLASS AND THE LIKE Filed Dec. 21, 1933 Ini/e nror. Carl 6. Anderson byMWW Patented Jan. 26, 1937 UNETED STATES PATENT Carl G. Anders on, Boston, Mass.

Application December 21, 1933, Serial No. 703,446

5 Claims.

This invention relates to apparatus for printing upon glass. The principal object of the invention is to provide a continuous metallic plate having a flexible printing face which will produce an even, sharply defined impression upon a sheet of frangible material, such as glass, irrespective of the uneven contour of the surface of the glass.

A further object of the invention is to provide a yielding pressure applying plate to be interposed between the special printing plate and the adjacent platen of a printing press, thereby to prevent the application of excessive pressure to the frangible sheets.

These and other objects and features of the invention will more fully appear from the following description and the accompanying drawing and will be particularly pointed out in the claims.

Inthe drawing:

Fig. 1 is a transverse sectional view of the apparatus;

Fig. 2. is a longitudinal sectional view through the apparatus;

Fig. 3 isa perspective View of the printing plate;

Figs. 4 and 5 are enlarged detail views illustrating preferred constructions of the back face of the printing plate.

It has always been very difficult to produce a satisfactory printed impression upon sheets of frangible material, such as glass. Many of the attempts to achieve this result have resulted in failure because the necessary pressure to produce a good impression would cause fracture of the material. This is especially true of attempts to print upon glass with a printing medium, such as an electrotype plate, an engraving, a stereotype plate or other similar metallic printing medium.

The present invention provides a practical solution of this problem and presents the means for satisfactorily producing an even, sharply defined printed impression of a picture, design or figure upon such material as sheet glass or material of a similarly frangible character.

Briefly, this means consists of a specially prepared printing plate desirably of metal, the printing face of which may be prepared by the electrotype process or any other similar process. This plate is so constructed that it will have such flexibility as to yield readily upon application of pressure and thereby engage every portion of the area of the surface to be printed upon regardless of the uneven contour of the surface. When using the ordinary metallic plate for the printing process involved herein, excessive pressure must be applied to the plate in order to provide even a very poor impression upon the frangible material. In many cases this excessive pressure causes fracture of the material, with its consequent waste. Undoubtedly, the reason for such breakage is the fact that when using a rigid printing plate the printing pressure causes the frangible material to follow the contour of the plate instead of the plate following the contour of the glass. Thus, disastrous strains are introduced in the material being printed upon.

The printing plate employed in the present invention is of substantially the same thickness as a standard electrotype plate. Its back face, however, is divided into a plurality of relatively small areas, while its front face is relatively thin and flexible so that when printing pressure is applied its printing face will follow a printing surface which may be of uneven contour.

The invention also provides a yielding pressure plate which may be used in conjunction with the printing plate to insure a uniform printing pressure throughout the area of the printing plate, such plate being designed also to prevent the application of excessive pressure and to avoid the necessity of extremely fine adjustment of the press.

The print of glass or other frangible material produced by the plate may thereafter be processed to produce various artistic eifects. With the impression as made upon a transparent plate, a wide variety of color effects may be produced by superposing upon the picture or design colored sheets cut to the outline of the various elements composing the picture, and placing such colored sheets in proper position upon the transparency to give color to the picture or design by light reflected from the colored sheets.

In order to present a clear and accurate conception of the invention, a particular embodiment thereof will be described.

The printing plate I may be constructed in various ways. A desirable method of constructing the plate is to form a plurality of grooves 2 in the back face 3 thereof. The plate I is desirably of substantial thickness, preferably of approximately the same thickness as a standard electrotype plate. The grooves 2 desirably extend across the plate both longitudinally and transversely, transverse grooves crossing the longitudinal grooves at an angle. The grooves 2, U therefore, divide the back face of the plate into a plurality of areas 4 which receive pressure from the platen 5 of the press and transmit such pressure to the printing face 6 of the plate I. The grooves 2 are of such depth that the surface zone of the printing face 6 of the plate I becomes quite flexible since each of the areas 4 is connected to its adjacent areas by a relatively thin section of metal I. The plate I may be constructed in numerous other ways, such as by providing a thin sheet 8 upon which the picture or design is formed and a plurality of areas 9, which may be secured to the thin sheet 8 in any desired manner, such as by brazing or soldering. The printing plate thus formed would function in the same manner as the plate above described.

While it is possible to obtain good results by utilizing the printing plate I in the printing press in the same manner as a standard electrotype would be used, a specially designed pressure plate is desirably provided to increase the effectiveness of the process. The pressure plate it may be of any suitable design. A desirable construction is shown in the drawing, which comprises a pair of spaced parallel upper and lower plates II and I2. The inner adjacent faces of the plates II and I2 are provided with a plurality of recesses I3 within which are received coiled springs I4 acting to separate the plates. The limit of separaiv tion of the plates is determined by the screws I5,

the heads of which bear on the lower face of the plate I2 while the shanks of the screws I5 slidably fit apertures in the plate I2 and have screw-threaded engagement with the plate II. The plate II may, therefore, have relative movement downwardly with relation to the plate I2. The heads of the screws I5 engage the lower face of the plate It so that by adjusting the screws I5 the printing plate may be properly positioned relatively to the thicknesses of the glass upon which the design is to be printed.

The printing plate I may be placed directly in contact with the upper plate I I. A more effective method, however, is tointerpose between the plate i and the plate II a sheet of rubber or other resilient material I6. To insure the proper register of the plate I with the platen ll of the press a plurality of positioning studs I8 are secured to the back face 3 of the plate I. The studs I8 extend downwardly through the rubber plate I6 and into the plate II, where they are loosely received in apertures I9. The plate I may, therefore, have relative motion towards or away from the plate II, but is restrained from lateral motion therewith. To prevent accidental removal of the plate I from the plate II a plurality of screws 20 is provided, which extend through the bottom face of the plate I I and have screw-threaded engagement with the studs H3. The heads of the screws 20 engage the lower face of the plate II and prevent removal of the plate I, which may, however, be readily removed by first removing the screws Zlll. In order to facilitate the removal of the screws 20, apertures 2! are provided in the plate I2. To provide intimate contact between the plate I2 and the platen 5 of the press, apertures 22 are formed in the press to receive the heads of the screws I5. The exact structure of the yielding plate I0 may be varied indefinitely within the scope of the construction defined in the following claims without departing from the invention.

To produce an inked impression upon the glass or other frangible sheet 23, the printing plate I is inked in the usual manner and the sheet 23 placed thereon and the press is operated to produce the desired printing pressure. The resulting impression of the picture or design represented upon the plate will be found to be sharply defined and perfectly even in density. In other words, it will be a perfect reproduction of the design or picture represented upon the plate. Such a reproduction may be produced by means of the present invention repeatedly and be of uniform quality without fracturing the sheet 23. The ordinary sheet glass which is taken as a typical example of the material printed upon by the present invention has invariably an uneven contour. The printing face of the plate I, however, is sufiiciently flexible to follow the unevenness in the surface of the plate and thereby evenly distribute the ink upon the printed surface. Furthermore, this even impression is accomplished without creating excessive strain in the plate itself, due to the fact that the printing pressure is distributed evenly throughout the sheet.

If the printing is done on transparent glass, a perfect transparency is produced which may be viewed by transmitted light and in itself becomes an attractive and serviceable decoration. Such a transparency lends itself readily to further em-' The various elements in the pic-' ture or design may be colored and illuminated to bellishment.

ing provided with intersecting channels extending from the reverse face of the sheet into proximity to the printing face, thereby rendering the printing-surface zone flexible and dividing the body into a multiplicity of small pressure-transmitting areas operable when the printing face is imposed upon the surface to be printed and pressure applied to said pressuretransmitting areas to cause such flexure of the printing-surface zone as to insure uniform impression of the design upon the surface of the glass and to avoid unequal pressure upon the glass which would be likely to cause it to fracture.

2. A printing plate for printing upon glass or the like comprising an integral metallic sheet of uniform thickness with a fiat face having means for printing a design, the body of the sheet being provided with intersecting channels, having a depth exceeding one-half of the thickness of the printing plate, extending from the reverse face of the sheet into proximity to the printing face, thereby rendering the printing-surface zone flexible and dividing the body into a multiplicityof small pressure-transmitting areas operable when the printing face is imposed upon the surface to be printed and pressure applied to said pressure-transmitting areas to cause such flexure of the printing-surface zone as to insure uniform impression of the design upon the surface of the glass and to avoid unequal pressure upon the glass which would be likely to cause it to fracture.

3. A device for printing designs upon glass or the like in a printing press having relatively movable platens, comprising an integral metallic sheet of uniform thickness with a fiat face having means for printing the design, the body of the sheet being provided with intersecting channels extending from the reverse face of the sheet into proximity to the printing face, thereby rendering the printing-surface zone flexible and dig vidi ng the body into a multiplicity of small pressure-transmitting areas, a pair of parallel spaced rigid metallic pressure plates upon one of which the printing plate is mounted with a sheet of elastic material therebetween and the other of which is adapted to be attached to one of the platens of the press, a plurality of springs interposed between said pressure plates, and means for relatively adjusting said pressure plates in accordance with the thickness of the glass to be printed for preventing relative lateral movement between said pressure plates.

4. A device for printing designs upon glass or the like in a printing press having relatively movable platens, comprising an integral metallic sheet of uniform thickness with a flat face having means for printing the design, the body of the sheet being provided with intersecting channels extending from the reverse face of the sheet into proximity to the printing face, thereby rendering the printing-surface zone flexible and dividing the body into a multiplicity of small pressuretransmitting areas, upper and lower parallel spaced rigid metallic pressure plates upon the upper of which the printing plate is mounted with a sheet of elastic material therebetween and the lower of which is adapted to be attached to one of the platens of the press, a plurality of springs interposed between said pressure plates, and screws seated in said upper plate slidably fitting apertures in said lower plate and having heads to engage the lower face thereof, operable adjustably to position the printing plate for different thicknesses of glass and also to prevent relative lateral movement between the upper and lower pressure plates.

5. A device for printing designs upon glass or the like in a printing press having relatively movable platens, comprising an integral metallic sheet of uniform thickness with a flat face having means for printing the design, the body of the sheet being provided with intersecting channels extending from the reverse face of the sheet into proximity to the printing face, thereby rendering the printing-surface zone flexible and dividing the body into a multiplicity of small pressuretransmitting areas, cylindrical studs fixedly secured to said reverse face of the printing sheet, upper and lower parallel spaced rigid metallic pressure plates having recesses to receive the stud of said printing plate, screws extending through said upper printing plate engaging said studs, springs interposed between said upper and lower printing plates, and screws slidably fitting apertures in said lower printing plates and seated in said upper printing plate having heads to engage the lower face of the lower printing plate operable adjustably to position the printing plate for different thicknesses of glass and also to prevent relative lateral movement between said upper and lower printing plates.

CARL G. ANDERSON. 

